


Of all the gin joints in all the world

by helpiamabug



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: AU, Character Study, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-10-20
Updated: 2010-10-20
Packaged: 2017-10-12 19:20:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,988
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/128204
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/helpiamabug/pseuds/helpiamabug
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>I can't help myself sometimes. I literally couldn't concentrate at work for the past two days while I tried to figure out all the kinks in this story. Rough, unbeta'd, but makes me happy. Standard disclaimer applies AKA, no profit being made, not mine, plz to not sue!</p>
            </blockquote>





	Of all the gin joints in all the world

Another Jedi is tailing Juno through the marketplace. She sighs and rolls her eyes, because even though she's used to death threats and poorly disguised security lurking around her doors at night - the Empire might have fallen, but there are still cells of stormtroopers out there who would love to kill the personal pilot to that traitor (Juno pauses, swallows hard), she's sure that there are very few of those individuals in the open air market she's currently strolling through on the outskirts of Coruscant. Even if there are, she thinks to herself, the blaster strapped to her waist and the exceptionally obvious job this particular Jedi is doing at making himself known as her guard would surely deter them. She manages to get a glimpse at this particular tail as she pretends to linger over the sweet apples being sold on the corner, although he bends to adjust his bootlace as she does - but this one is much the same as the rest, loose black training pants, simple tunic, lightsabers strapped to his shoulders - however, he does wear a black hooded cloak drawn so far forward over his face that all she can make out is the dark stubble on his chin and the deep shadows falling over the rest of his face. Galen used to wear a cloak like that, she thinks. For a while after she found it in the forward hold of the Rogue Shadow she used to curl up with it and bury her face in the hood, desperately inhaling that scent - his scent, the ozone smell of Force lightning and sweat, and let herself cry when no one but PROXY was watching. Now it stays at the bottom of her drawer, except after a particularly bad day. For a moment as he rises, though, Juno thinks she catches a glimpse of snapping black eyes and hair - she shakes herself, firmly tells herself that she will stop torturing herself, Galen is dead, she saw him die - and shoulders her purchases, heading towards her quarters.

She loves this apartment - the one indulgence she allowed herself with her combat pay from all the missions she flew with Starkiller - most of it was squirrelled away in various bank accounts, or used to pay off sources here and there during those fierce early skirmishes with the Empire. It's near enough to the Jedi temple that she can see the spires on a clear day, and surrounded by clear glass windows on three sides so that it is open and airy even in the dreary confines of the city. Juno can sit for hours and hours and watch the speeders rush past, staring out at the city or up at the few stars she can see through the thick atmosphere, and feel free. She loves working next to Senator Organa and Leia is a fair and just ruler - she tells herself she would have left if she were otherwise, but truly, she remembers those moments that she and Galen both spent with the Princess and it feels better to know that someone else misses him, too. Juno pauses in the vestibule and sheds her cloak and boots so that she wears only a simple linen tunic and leggings, like most other humans on Coruscant, but she keeps the blaster pistol tucked into the waistband. She might be optimistic but she is no fool, and she didn't survive years on the Outer Rim to die now. The sun has begun to set and she can see that PROXY has come and gone (probably to do another one of his security sweeps) by the new alarm around her bedroom window and dinner warming on her counter. It's sweet, really, how his programming has adjusted to her lifestyle - instead of trying to kill her on a daily basis, he's waking her up in the morning with tiny eggshell cups of coffee and sweet buns from the bakery down the street and strategically placing weapons around the apartment in case she should ever be ambushed on her territory. Juno settles herself on the couch with the latest draft of Princess Leia's speech regarding the treatment of non-humanoid species and a glass of sweet spiced wine that she bought in the marketplace today, and tells herself firmly she will get through at least half of it before she falls asleep and drools on the other half, so, of course, she is woken up an hour later by a smart rap on the door of her apartment. The sensors have switched the overhead lights off so that her apartment is lit only by the headlights of speeders passing by and the glow of her bedside lamp - she answers the door still mostly asleep but with her blaster in her hand, half-hidden behind her back.

It is the Jedi from the marketplace.

He is no longer wearing the simple training tunic and pants and hooded cloak she remembers. Instead, he is bare chested and wearing a shoulder guard that covers the broad sweep of his shoulders and the lower part of his face so that all Juno can see is the bridge of his nose and his eyes as he pushes past her without speaking , lightsabers out and ready as he sweeps through the apartment, checking closets and cabinets and under her table for gods knows what before he nods to himself and turns to go, having searched her apartment for threats, his duties apparently discharged for the evening. Before he gets through the door, though, she steels her nerve and steps forward, pressing her hand to his chest. The Jedi freezes, and his lightsabers blaze into life - a warning, perhaps - as she rests her other hand on his hip, her thumb pressing against a long scar that cuts from just below his sternum through his abdominal muscles and dips below the waistband of his pants, a stark white against the warm tan skin.

She knows this scar.

Darth Vader gave Galen this scar.

She remembers picking him up out of the snow and pressing her hand down into his guts to stop the bleeding, remembers sewing it up herself in the hold of the Rogue Shadow as PROXY paced, pressing bacta patches to his skin and praying to the Force, to all the gods she'd ever heard of that he would just stop screaming and wake up.

The Jedi is shaking, she thinks, or perhaps she is - she doesn't know - all she knows is that she cannot stop herself from reaching out and running her hands up his chest, grasping the buckles of his shoulder guard and unclipping them, one by one, drawing the armour down so she can see his face - so she can finally know, once and for all. She closes her eyes and pulls down, and when she opens them, she is looking straight at Galen Marek, the dead hero of the Republic.

He reaches out towards her, his lightsabers forgotten on the floor - and it's like a reflex, she can't help herself: she hauls off and punches him, right in his stupid not at all dead Jedi face.

Galen staggers back and presses his hand to his cheekbone where it's already blooming red, and for a moment her mind goes totally blank and it's like she's an actor on a stage and she's just waiting, waiting - for the curtain to rise, for that moment before the lights come up - she has no idea what's going to happen next - and then he looks up at her, and he smiles. Not that sly little half-smirk he used to give Kota before he'd run off and almost get himself killed on another mission, but the real thing, and Juno gives a little hiccuping gasp as he sweeps her up in his arms. She struggles for a minute, but he smells so good, just like she remembers - and he's warm, and alive, and standing in her apartment and burying his face in her hair. They fall back together onto her couch, and it seems like the most natural thing in the world to thread her hands around his neck and press her mouth to his - and her heart is pounding in her ears as his lips part against hers, all fierce heat as he bites her lower lip and soothes it again with gentle kisses. It doesn't take her long to sweep her clever fingers up against his Jedi ceremonial robes and find the tie under his collarbone, to push the robes back off his shoulder, to slide her lips against the pulsepoint in his throat and lick up towards his ear, catching his earlobe between her teeth and simply breathing her desire in his ear as he melts against her entirely, his broad shoulders pinning her - he is heavy, but she doesn't care, because he is here, in her apartment - Starkiller's skin is hot against hers, and he has rucked up her tunic so that he can kiss the soft swells of her breasts, and when did that happen? She is lost in the onslaught of his lips against hers, and he is crackling with the Force so that every touch seems electric, his skin glowing, his hands trace trails in the air as he runs them down her back and pulls her closer to him. She reaches back for the loose end of her binding cloth and slowly pulls it free - her nipples are hard in the cool air, and he dips his head and laves his tongue across first one, then the other, biting and licking and soothing his way across her chest and down her soft stomach. Her muscles tense and relax against his mouth as he sinks to his knees and wraps his a rms around her hips. Galen pauses then, and presses his cheek to her belly - looks up at her, and this moment is too much - for a whole year after he disappeared, she spent a lot of time thinking about what she wanted to say to him if she ever saw him again. Some days it was along the lines of 'I love you, you idiot', or to read him the riot act about leaving her all alone in the galaxy to fight his battles for him or to just shout about galactic politics after a rough day in the Senate. What she would say, how cruelly she would cut him for being stupid and impetuous and wasting his life (or sometimes, how gracious she would be in welcoming back and introducing him to her new lover, or how she would make him work for each kiss she gave him and never answer his calls). She was angry and lonely, and then pitying and swept up in self-righteous fury with the Empire and with him, and then she was just tired and sad. And he is here, and all Juno Eclipse - legendary pilot, leader of the Rebellion - can do is laugh and want to cry at the same time and she has to reach for her next shuddering breath, and she sinks down onto the floor next to him, climbs into his lap, and presses her face into his neck.

The only sound in the apartment for a long while is the muted rush of traffic, and the sound of two people breathing.

Eventually her legs go numb, and she untangles her fingers from his hair and draws him up to the couch, and settles against him as he tucks the corners of his discarded cloak around them both. Galen wraps both arms around her so she can hardly breath, but she doesn't mind. In the morning, they will walk to the corner bakery hand in hand and sit and talk for hours, and he will answer all her unanswered questions. For now, though, she can hear the beating of his heart as she drifts off to sleep on his collarbone, and that is good enough.


End file.
